Out of all of the rpgs with Star in the name, this is like.. 2nd place.

What happens when someone who has never played a Bethesda developed game before plays a game that everyone only compares to other Bethesda games? Well...

I mean there are a couple good things..? I mean.. the scale is impressive and some of the model density looks pretty good. I couldn't play many of the faction quests for a reason i'll bring up later, but the one I did play was pretty solid. The acting and sound design are all pretty good. And occasionally the flow of combat is pretty fun. But.. DAMN.

It's not even just the bugs. Most of the bugs I got were the funny kind and those honestly added to my enjoyment. Shit like untextured wireframe circles on certain planets, spazzing out animations, 4 conversations happening with one character at the same time, spinning ships in space those were fucking hilarious. Those are fine.

There were a couple genuine bugs that impacted my enjoyment, like one of the faction quests not starting, which was disappointing because that was the one that, from what I heard, everyone likes the most. On the technical side my biggest issue is how ugly the character models and face animation can be, which did impact my experience considering how much of this game is talking to various npcs. At times it felt like I was in a survival horror game. There were a couple frame drops here and there, and the game crashed three times, but apart from that, I think the technical state isn't the worst?

Funnily enough, this game manages to find a way to fail both as an open world game and an rpg in completely different ways. Obviously the fact that exploration between planets is exclusively fast travel that you don't even need to get in your ship to do is kinda lame. But the main issue for me is how barren these planets are and how little to find and explore there is on there. I heard the planets are procedurally generated so maybe I was just unlucky, but with the exception of a few cool planets with different mid exploration events, it was mostly just barren empty space with visual locations that stop getting super interesting the longer I play. Ships are mostly just used for floaty, janky space ship combat that doesn't even control that well, so maybe thats why we cant fly straight between planets.

Additionally, the resource gathering in this game is REAL BAD. Not only is the encumbrance limit way too low, but transferring items between you and your partners is an exhaustive process that is way too time consuming for what's supposed to be just a simple task.

Additionally, I REALLY didn't like the story. Without getting into spoilers, most of the story is not super engaging or interesting with a bland cast of characters carried by their admittedly great voice acting. I was mildly entertained by the ending because, even if it was a predictable twist, a twist in general is still one that's entertaining to see unfold. But yeah, the writing in the one faction quest I did was actually fairly strong.

Yeah.. I just couldn't vibe with this one. Maybe at some point in the future, I'll continue to explore some of the side content in this one, but for now, I'm just kinda done and don't want to use up that much more time on a game that just isn't working for me. It has good stuff in it, but if this game is being criticized or praised for being as good as any other bethesda rpg, then maybe I should just stick with the shit Obsidian's making.

See? It's possible to criticize this game without being transphobic! It's not hard, either!

I didn't feel like editing all my notes so this one's coming in hot

the menus, ui/ux, and maps are nothing short of awful and the emphasis on fast travel, witcher vision, and waypoint markers make starfield one of the least convincing game worlds in recent memory. an endless sequence of vacuum sealed content boxes strung together by constant menus, loading screens, and teleporting, and bolstered on all sides by hundreds of procgen wastelands full of crafting junk

it's frustrating that there's something here I think I could like, but it's completely obstructed by design decisions that only make sense if your first and last priority is scale. aside from some dungeons and sidequests it feels like your only options are to be led by the nose like a dog or left to wander nothing areas for the rest of your life. a critical bug had me chasing my tail for over an hour on one of the essential planets and I was bored out of my brain so I can't imagine how sterile the non-essential ones must be

can't weigh in much on the RPG side of things cos I barely saw it in 10+ hours. it's like a cryptid where people keep swearing it exists but I'm still not convinced. can say that the dialogue options I've seen aren't too far off from the YES / YES (SARCASTIC) / NO (YES) we know and love from FO4 tho. writing doesn't go full head trauma this time around as quickly but everyone's a Quip Bastard or a block of wood so it's kinda six of one half a dozen of the other. the most memorable moment was when heller went chris dorner on the new atlantis police department unprovoked, but somehow I don't think that was what bethesda intended

perks/skills are as lifeless as expected. 10% more damage with shotguns or 10% damage with pistols or 10% damage with energy weapons or 10% damage with rifles or carry 10 more pounds or have 10% more health or..... zzzz

less I say about space and ship combat the better. everyone knows it wouldn't be better handled through a menu, but what this review presupposes is... maybe it would?

all in all it's a mess. bethesda's signature open world fractured and dashed across the stars; a marriage of some of the worst aspects of both pre and post morrowind eras with a slew of new unforced errors added to the mix. modders will fix what's fixable, I'll keep drinking that garbage, and the world will keep on turning

can't wait for skyrim 2

Man I really wanted to like this but jesus christ this just feels silly a lot of the time
30 hours of regugitating similar scenes, bad models, constant map transition scenes, bad effects, hit or miss puzzles just for the last 5 or 10 hours to have actual things happen isnt worth it. 999's structure made for a super enjoyable and fairly clever trip down alternative paths (with some pseudoscience) fun but the way this game attempts to accomplish that is obnoxious it feels like a good chunk of the game is just meandering through similar scenes to maybe get 1 or 2 useful pieces of information only for it to reach a final point in which its nothing but a nonstop of new, complex information to process. After a certain point in the final stretch I seriously wondered why this even really needed to be made? It's got some neat character moments, some puzzles are alright, its at least fairly forgiving with some QoL features (the flow chart/skip button). By the end the game gets interesting but would I say it's really worth the constant back-and-forth of the previous 30 hours, not really. Also god this game looks ugly like really, like christ this game would go up a point if I didnt have to stare at models that looked worse than mid-aughts gmod videos.